Milton Creagh

Wow, what a surprising presentation today. We had a man who goes by the name of Milton Creagh come speak to us about abuse and domestic violence in our daily lives. He shared some frightening statistics like 1 in 3 women are being abused at home. At first,  I thought it was just going to be one of those really boring assembly's or something like that, but when time passed it got interesting and the message that he conveyed was powerful.

He has already spoken to hundreds of thousands of students before us and said his gift of being an orator was "ordained by God." Milton Creagh mentions how he was born in North Carolina but spent most of his time in Chicago, where he started taking an interest in public speaking. He is a workaholic and appeals to to his lecture schedule. Despite being so busy, he still has time to devote to his writing passion.

He talked about having $3 shoes and that Converse shoes were all the rage back in his time, instead of Nike and  Reebok etc. Milton Creagh showed us how deeply we are related to one another, because most of us have lost our close ones due to the violence in our world. We live in such a treacherous world, because we allow those things to happen. It takes just a little effort to make the world a better place.

Finally, we are actually given free time and assignments have stopped coming. Haha, just kidding, we have midterms this week. I've yet to present my Historical Globalization and Identity project and I envy the people who are already finished. It's like dropping 50 pounds off your back. I can not give up my childish desires for candy and treats, so people can expect a knock on their door this coming Sunday. I hate the non-spirited people who just keep their lights turned off to wade away the sugar craving mob of kids. At least we aren't dressing up as grim reapers and knocking on the windows of old retirement homes.



Hump day comes slowly to this week ridden with major assignments and midterms.  I didn't do bad on the Social unit test, which has given me back a bunch of confidence and relief back. This week isn't much of an interesting week either, but I've heard that we have some presentation that will take place during T.A tomorrow. Hopefully it is interesting and not one of those agonizing presentations where most students stare at the ground for an hour or so. Aside from that, it's was an easy Wednesday today, that's all I'm thanking God for right now.

I'm not sure what I'm going to do for my pursuit. It's already October, so I don't have a valid excuse to say that I don't have an idea for my pursuit. I seriously don't want to raise money, but I want to raise awareness. Maybe, I'll go volunteering to a homeless shelter, and drag like a few people along. Then again, that sounds really boring. I'm such an uncreative person. I need to consort with people of greater knowledge, hehehehe.

I seriously question why we have to do so much assignments. I know that homework is given when there is not enough class time, but creating more work on top of that such as multimedia presentations to convey information, posters, or other technological means to reinforce the information we've learned is really crappy. I miss the days when all we had to do were analytical papers, critical thinking, answering textbook questions, and responding to the text with supportive evidence. I miss old pen and paper work. How many times did we open our textbooks this year?

Through my eyes, education is becoming more reliant on technology. Learning was always on a hellbent mission to make it more "engaging" and "fun." "By creating more rigorous tasks to be done online, we can make students enjoy learning!" Seriously? It's no surprise that only 10% of Canadian children are physically active. We're cooped inside all day doing stressful homework. What do we do when we're stressed, we eat to try and cope with it.




Health nuts and scientists are blaming parents for bad eating habits, but can stress play a role? Teenagers can't go out and exercise and follow dreams and ambitions if a huge brick wall is in their way. Physical inactivity leads to osteoporosis, heart disease, diabetes and much more. What's the use of working hard and being successful if your childhood health is affected leading to an earlier death. Man, it sucks being in I.B.

I completely and utterly failed the TFA essay on my standards. On the bright side, it's Friday! I don't know what to do for the weekend, except homework. I did so much homework this week; it has become a second nature for me. It's the weekend of spirited trick-or-treaters who go door to door seeking pleasure in wondrous treats of sugar and candy. Monday is a Faith Day, where we are given a day off. Thank goodness, I can relax for a day and then focus completely on my essay re-write and Math midterm review.

I still need to present my country research presentation which has been like 10 pounds of bricks on my shoulders. The introduction of this IA thing is interesting because we can research something we have a passion for; although I think we are limited to the bounds of Social class. Nothing interesting has happened this week, so there is a limit to how much I can spew out my thoughts. Finally there is a Math midterm on Wednesday that I have been drastically trying to study for, just by doing this three page double-sided page

We are starting a new module in Foods class, luckily for me, I've earned two credits so far by passing the past few modules. For this module we are going in depth with milk and egg products. Finally, something I'm actually competent in with cooking. I was really surprised when I first walked into Foods class, because despite being a three credit course, there is much work to do. I was expecting that we would just finish a bible long worth of notes and assignments, and then we start cooking consecutively for the next three months. Boy was I wrong.

We had an amusing class discussion in Mr.Roculan's class on Friday. He did a survey on the stress level of students on a scale of "1-10." Most people raised their hand on the 10 mark. Mr.Roculan's perception on the stress level for the grade 10 honors class should be around 5-6. The stress level for grade 11 kids should be around 8. Now for the people who are really stressed out, imagine what grade 11 will be like. I'm going to be honest and say that out of all my classes, 90% of my stress comes from S.S and ELA. It's worst enough that the human mind is exhausted after thinking for 2 hours, now imagine working for 6 hours. I see that most of my peers are having troubles keeping up with their blogs. It sucks when your week is so busy, your forced to use the remaining weekend to frantically blog, which is exactly what I'm doing right now. Now imagine having an exhausted mind, it only becomes harder to pull words out of your head.

Here's what one of my most stressful days looked like. Alright, I walk into ELA and hear that the Igbo research assignment is due on Monday. I think it's cool, I'm sure I can complete using the weekend but the people presenting on Thursday should consider themselves EXTREMELY fortunate. I walk into my next class and hear that any outstanding work is due next Friday. I become a little more worried because I still had to finish a novel for the Conquest of the Broken Spears assignment. Yeah, I know that it was awhile ago, but it completely slipped my mind with the introduction of new assignments. I have lunch and go into my Food's class. Wonderful news, we have a unit exam, and I have 5 pages of information to memorize, along with a grain research project also due on Monday. Math class was no different, we have a formal worksheet due on, you guessed it, Monday, and our unit test was on the day after. It couldn't possibly get any worst when I had three blogs to catch up on.

The source of the stress is the amount of time we have to use each night to complete each separate task. As the day progresses, the more my thoughts get jumbled, and soon,  my judgment becomes impaired and my actions are carried out without thought. I almost brushed my teeth with vaseline one night because I was under so much trauma. The weekend; a three day grace  period where average North American families stay home from work and school to associate with each other, attend mass, go swimming, or paying a trip to the Saddledome to see their hockey team play. All of these things, I missed because of the numerous amount of work I had to do. I reflected upon my actions that week and honestly admit that I have not once procrastinated or goofed off that week.

Tight schedule this weekend,country historical globalization and identity presentations are coming. I envy people who still have "free time" to spend on their jobs, assignments and what not.

Presentations due dates for our country has come closer, and we can breath a sigh of relief because we don't have to add an MDG component to it since we are not that far advance yet. We don't have to present to the entire Grade 10 honors class so we can breath another sigh of relief. At first, I thought that we were presenting to like 80 kids and 3 teachers, but now I'm a whole lot less worried. Many people complain about blogging constantly which tremendously increases our workload, but I think it is a good thing because blogging for your country forces you to research and what you researched can be used for future presentations.

I'm planning to volunteer for "The Mustard Seed," an organization that helps the less fortunate in Calgary. Last year, they've provided emergency shelter to 2800 people, 397,000 meals, independent housing opportunities for 530 and much more. They are offering guest speakers to come and speak to church communities, organizations or schools. I might try to get a guest speaker to come to our school and talk about volunteering, maybe that will make it easier for some students to find a way to participate in the community, because people are running around panicking about how they are going to fail.

I can't say I'm excited about the whole grand scheme of things. I even regret joining I.B. For a person like me who has completely no spare time on the weekend to expend on assignments, I choose the wrong path to take. From day til dawn whether weekend or weekend, my mind is completely focused on school. Maybe that's why my old social teacher said that she envied the way I still had "free time" to burn last year. Of course, there's always the option of going partial next year.

Today, Martin, a marathon runner and trianthalon champion came to our school to raise awareness about Right to Play. The 54 year old althlete has raised $110,000 by running across the country whether alone or with fellow Canadian students. In his daily life, he has to manage his eating habits by taking in 5,000 calories a day to maintain his weight. At his age, he’s probably going to be more physically active than I’ll ever be in my entire life, unless I become a WWE wrestler and not some accountant filing papers and doing your taxes with my face glued to the computer for 60 hours a week. Sounds like a really fun career.

China, as a whole country has never been successfully colonized. Maybe 5-10% of the country (important lands and seaports) have been under control by foreign countries. Hong Kong has been colonized by the British; however the Chinese were surprised by how prosperous their economy has been and how well the government has been established. The Dutch invaded and colonized Taiwan. Portugal got its hands on Macau. Hong Kong has been given back to the China recently in 1997. Western countries have supported the separation of China. Outer Mongolia, with the help of the USSR got its independence. North east and west regions were controlled by Russia until just recently.

In other news, China and the US are facing disputes amongst each other on the Dalai Lama. China is threatening Obama to not meet the Dalai Lama or else it will sever the trust between the two countries. I don’t know how this works, but Chinese officials say they don’t want inferences in their country affairs. China is also not open up to any sort of negotiations. The US was recently involved in a 6.4 billion arms deal with Taiwan which has angered Beijing. At the time being, the deal involved only defensive armaments but if this case was the opposite, Beijing would be infuriated.

Rescuers rush to reach 11 trapped in China coal mine

11 miners were trapped in a coal mine explosion; relatives and friends are standing by, hoping for the safe return of their companions. It has been confirmed that 5 more people have died by Sunday, increasing the death toll to 26. This has come in unexpectedly just shortly after the similar Chiliean mining incident. The world is still celebrating the safe return of 33 miners in Chile, but I'm sure that they will deal with this cautiously like the previous incident. I'd say that China's mining industry is the most dangerous in the world because a similar event occured at the same mine last year and killed 23. Thousands of miners were killed last year and leaders are trying to improve mining safety.

China is the largest producer and consumer of coal. The Chinese produce about 40% of all the coal in our entire world. Their vast reserves will last for another 48 years and some coal reserves are yet to be developed. Mining in China is said to be the world's deadliest because of their worst safety record. Most of the accessible coal is in northern China opposed to the south where it is polluted by sulphur and ash, making it unusable for most things.

Tommorow is quiz day for math and presentation day for our Igbo project. I'm researching religion for our group presentation and I was not suprised at how accurate Chinua Achebe depicts the Igbo in Things Fall Apart. The life of an Igbo was heavily centered on religion. There are many gods in Igbo culture. There was a god of the sky, a god of the earth, water, etc. Their supreme deity, the god of all gods in Igbo religion was called Chukwu. Sacrifices were made to please the gods.

The Opium war began in 1839 between the Qing dynasty and the British.The British wanted goods but the Chinese would only accept silver currency.When Opium began to be used recreationally, the British traded opium for silver.It became a highly effective solution due to its addictive nature.People started spending all their money on Opium which reversed China’s economy.

The Chinese dumped smuggled Opium into the sea and the British troops retaliated by wreaking havoc.An unequal treaty was signed, the treaty of Nanking, China had to open four ports to trade, and cede Hong Kong over to Queen Victoria.

In terms of colonization, China is interesting, because as an entire country, it has never been successfully colonized.Maybe around 5-10% of the country (consisting of important lands and seaports) has been under control by foreign countries.

-The Dutch took control of Taiwan.

-Portugal got its hands on Macao

-British got its hands on Hong Kong.

Friday

Friday at last, and the weather looks grim. There's suppose to be sunlight tomorrow, but I don't see how that's possible. From yesterday's news, China's five year growth plan is on it's way, but analysts discover an economic imbalance. They will also looking for China's new leader in 2012. Today, the leaders of China are coming together to discuss further actions in their economics. 23 Communist Party elders signed a letter to to stop restrictions on the freedom of speech. Leaders are addressing the issue with the economic imbalance by trying to reduce the gap between the rich and the poor, thus annihilating strikes and differences in pay.

In present day, traditional Chinese dresses are not worn anymore. These days, those dresses are used for celebrations. Jeans are common in China, as they are anywhere in the world. This is the result of globalization. In Chinese weddings, the bride would wear the a bridal gown like the ones we wear. Black is a popular colour in traditional clothing and bright red is preferred for special events, holidays, and ceremonial events. Few people wear shorts in China, especially men.

The Chinese have a concept called "face." It can be easily associated with the reputation or credibility of a person. Insulting, embarassing or demeaning a person in anyway will cause them to lose "face." A Chinese warrior, during ancient times may commit sucide because he has lost "face," after losing a battle. The concept of "face" is still around in modern China.

Chaos

Today was a chaotic day for us I.B children, or more so, a chaotic week. Despite having only a four day week, our workload has quadrupled from last month. We have to do an essay today and quiz today, a exam the day after, and doing homework for six hours a day. I was worried about our MDG presentations and our expectations, but I was relieved when Ms.Ponce graciously came over today in our social class and showed us some examples. I seriously need to chill, we still have 2 months to get together our presentation, but the anxiety from presenting to two other classes is nerve wrecking. I just need to overcome it, somehow.

In third period, we had an author come speak to us about her book. Some viewed it as a chance to sleep and not pay attention, while others actually took some in some information. I was dissapointed, unlike others, about missing third period, because we were cooking legumes in foods class today. Connie Massing, playwright and screenwriter read us a portion of her book. The men and women in her theatre group set out a road trip to explore south central Alberta. From gopher museums to gourmet dining, she expressed Alberta, that is often misunderstood as the cowboy province of Canada.

Things are looking good in China, officials are expecting an annual growth of 7.5% during their five year economic plan. In a few years, China might be the most economic superior country in the world possibly surpassing the United States. However, China is facing an economc imbalance problem. The poorest people are surviving off slum shops, selling shoes, clothing and other cheap accomadations. Not far away, is the business district, home to many hotels and multi-national companies. These two areas are seperated by a few hundred metres, and show China's successes and failures.

Things Fall Apart

We've just finished Things Fall Apart and I wasn't surprised at the conclusion because people kept spoiling the ending. I understand Okonkwo's intention of reclaiming back their once prosperous culture and society, but if they fought back, the colonizers would only come back with their advanced technology and raze all their buildings away. It is a shame how the successors of Mr.Brown are closed minded to Igbo culture. The D.C. thinks he can write an excellent paragraph or two about Okonkwo's life when you can write a novel. It is Achebe's way of denoting how people pronounce that they know every single thing about Igbo culture and how society should be run, but really their goal of peace is created by destroying others.

For the project we were assigned earlier this week, our group has decided to do Religion and Colonization as two of our main themes. We're thinking about using PowerPoint for the basis of our presentation but it looks really boring, so we are still looking into that. Hopefully we could do a little video presentation but no one in our group really knows about how to put that together. Next week will be a more productive week if we don't run into even more assignments on our hands. Thank goodness it's a group project, I was thinking that I won't see the sun for awhile, being bottled up and working hard late at night.

Today, I've decided to start researching again for my MDG country, China. I looked into their diet and not surprisingly found rice. In Asia, this grain is very popular, but the only thing I know about it is that its white and oval and I eat it almost every day. Rice farming was the first grain that was cultivated in China that dates back to 5000 B.C. However it is not grown in northern China because the climate just doesn't support it. If you were wealthy enough, you could of bought or grown vegetables to put on your rice. Since meat was so expensive, people ate tofu as their source of protein. China didn't have lots of forests that could provide fuel, so Chinese people cut their food into small pieces so that it would cook faster.